


her lips are like the galaxy’s edge

by bisexualklausmikaelson



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-07 00:20:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14068809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bisexualklausmikaelson/pseuds/bisexualklausmikaelson
Summary: she’s serpent territory now, au after 2x16 or the one where Cheryl runs away to be with Toni.





	her lips are like the galaxy’s edge

─

She stares at the trembling girl before her, and Cheryl looks back at her as if she is a frightened little mouse.

Concern coats her every action, Toni rushes her inside and immediately tends to her wounds. She uncovers scratch after scratch, and twig after twig. Leaves and dirt in Cheryl’s beautiful beautiful ruby red hair ─

(She sits in the shower and does nothing but cry for, what feels like, hours. All the while, Toni is there, holding her hand).

─

Cheryl dodges all her questions, and Toni knows better than to pry.

She looks like she’s been through hell and back, and the last thing she wants to do is to face an interrogation. Trust is something they both have major issues with but, nevertheless, it’s not impossible to overcome.

Toni knows that she’ll talk to her when she’s ready.

However long that may take.

─

The first night, Cheryl wants to have dinner alone in Toni’s room, even though everyone’s downstairs and she can hear them.

She recognizes those strong Serpent laughs anywhere. They sound like a fun gang ─ she catches herself thinking. Loose and kind, like a real family. Like something she’s never had, something she’s always so desperately wanted.

(There’s a hesitant knock on the door and Cheryl whispers a slow ‘come in’ and it feels like she hasn’t heart her own voice in days. God, she sounded so fucking weak.

Toni joins her with a hot plate of food and sits close. She pulls out her laptop, turns on an episode of Gossip Girl and makes sure that it’s loud enough to drown out all her Cheryl’s tears.

She was in her home now, and Toni wasn’t going to let anything bad ever happen to her girl).

─

She stays in while Toni goes to school.

The decision is Cheryl’s and Cheryl’s alone and it’s the first time she feels like she’s finally in control of something. It’s good, refreshing in fact ─

FP comes by to drop off some burgers for lunch and she devours each and everyone as if she hasn’t eaten since last Christmas. He chuckles softly and notices how ordinary she looks right now. In Toni’s old grey sweater and ripped jeans, her hair in a messy bun, some sandals.

The old Cheryl would never allow anyone to see her like this. But, this was just FP Jones, it’s not like it was anyone at school. So she lets her guard down.

“You look nice,” he softly says, patting her on shoulder.

Cheryl smiles awkwardly and nods. And, in a weird way, she makes him think of Jellybean back when she was still a baby.

Naïve and shy, just a quiet little girl.

─

(One night, she watches Toni put on her leather jacket, the one with the snake on it.

Her heart feels heavy when she notices the little things ─ the not-so-obvious things. How there are long horizontal scars on Toni’s wrists and Cheryl can’t help but think that they weren’t left on there by accident.

She’s sad too, she can tell. And the redhead wonders how much she actually knows about the other girl.

Toni kisses her cheek before she leaves and it makes her realize that she’s no longer a Blossom.

She’s Serpent territory now ─ and she’s not sure how that makes her feel).

─

When she’s finally ready to leave Toni’s room, Jughead is the one who greets her first. It’s awkward and uneasy but he’s nothing but kind to her. She knows FP must’ve put in a good word for her, or else Jughead would’ve never shown even the smallest amount of gentleness to the same Cheryl Blossom who tried to ruin his relationship with Betty Cooper.

But, he’s still offering her a smile as she walks passed him to get to the washroom.

Maybe, this is his peace offering and this is their fresh start.

─

Dinner with the Serpents is…anything but glamorous.

Sweet Pea is downing three plates of food while Fangs is rowdy and obnoxiously drunk. FP and Jughead are doing shots, one after another, dancing like fools while almost tripping. Even Betty is there, now wearing a Serpents jacket. Toni is a mess of laughter as she passes Cheryl a joint.

She wants to hesitate but, Cheryl had shown her world, so it’s only right that Toni does that same.

(And she hates to say it, but she might just like this world a lot more than her own).

─

Later that evening, Toni takes her out for a ride on her motorcycle.

They’ve sobered up and now there’s nothing but adrenaline and screaming. Soft words behind pink lips and when they pull over next to Sweet Water River, it’s like a new beginning.

The start of something else, with her dead brother’s memory long gone and a girl who means the world to her standing in front her.

They kiss under the stars that night, and Cheryl realizes that Toni tastes like cherries. Sweet and tangy, with just a hint of mischievousness.

─

She spends more and more nights crying herself to sleep and every time, Toni is there. Her warm arms wrap around her waist as she spoons her and cuddles close.

The redhead has never felt safer.

─

It takes her months to tell Toni what actually happened

And she swears she’ll tear Good Old Mother Blossom apart, that she’ll send all her Serpents after her and Uncle Blossom ─

But, Cheryl holds her and finally tells her that wants to go as far away from Riverdale as possible.

Toni is resilient, but still, she knows that the other girl isn’t ready for any of this. Not now anyway. And the last thing she wants to do is trigger Cheryl. So instead, she takes her away. She has a back-up plan in mind.

─

So they leave.

Toni tells her she’ll take her to a doctor, a real one this time. And against all odds, Cheryl believes her.

She holds her hand as she sits in the therapist’s the waiting room, looking incredibly nervous.

“Remember what I told you,” Toni says, squeezing her hand.

“That this doctor is different,” Cheryl nods, “She’s not going to hurt me, she’s going to help me,” she affirms, looking her right in the eye.

“And she knows you like girls, and she’s okay with it,” she reminds her, making sure that she knows she’s safe here. This place is not that insane asylum her mother brought her to. This place is better, real and focused on helping Cheryl deal with her trauma.

“False,” she suddenly says, smiling. “I like a girl,” Cheryl tells her. “I like you.”

The other girl kisses her on the cheek as a reward.

She knows that with Toni by her side, she can take on anything.

─


End file.
